Anyone know about Naresh Sohal?

[jayne lee wilson]

Apologies - I should have read your post more carefully. I'm glad they're not taking the kids! It does look as if the three part programme may be a device to try to entice an audience, having been saddled with 45' of new music by someone they won't have heard of. I wonder if the commission was for a shorter piece and it turned out to be twice as long as expected?!

If it's any comfort, my memory is that this composer doesn't go in for stuff that might frighten the horses, certainly not rebarbative modernism. More like Bollywood

Yes, just like Schoenberg. Found his voice in Transfigured Night and stuck with it. Didn't want to lose his fans!

But you're SO right. Proms should be planned with the needs of parents and children uppermost in our minds. So the music really "needs to be good"! I mean, a Dr Who prom wouldn't be a good idea would it? Never sustain interest with that...

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES! That upstart Sohal took REALLY took advantage of the noble BBC didn't he? All that NEW music. DISgraceful!

[Barbirollians]

Yes, just like Schoenberg. Found his voice in Transfigured Night and stuck with it. Didn't want to lose his fans!

But you're SO right. Proms should be planned with the needs of parents and children uppermost in our minds. So the music really "needs to be good"! I mean, a Dr Who prom wouldn't be a good idea would it? Never sustain interest with that...

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES! That upstart Sohal took REALLY took advantage of the noble BBC didn't he? All that NEW music. DISgraceful!

There is nothing wrong with lengthy premieres per se surely but it is a rather long programme with the two big warhorses to follow . I assume RLD is just speculating as to why the programming is so unusual not that all commissions should be of short pieces.

As for Mary's son's dilemma- if his other half needs persuading along to concerts in the first place I can see the concern over such a lengthy new piece - moreover Proms that finish late are difficult for those who have to travel home.

It is clearly a very important part of the Proms to commission new music - the recent Ades and David Matthews pieces have been fascinating - the piece that opened the NYOUSA concert rather less so but that doesn't mean that one is addicted to a diet of popular classics just because one is apprehensive about a very long piece of new music.

[Mary Chambers]

Yes, just like Schoenberg. Found his voice in Transfigured Night and stuck with it. Didn't want to lose his fans!

But you're SO right. Proms should be planned with the needs of parents and children uppermost in our minds. So the music really "needs to be good"! I mean, a Dr Who prom wouldn't be a good idea would it? Never sustain interest with that...

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES! That upstart Sohal took REALLY took advantage of the noble BBC didn't he? All that NEW music. DISgraceful!

I don't know if it's intentional, but this post seems to me to have a rather unpleasant tone. I was making an enquiry because of a particular human situation, and RleD was responding in perfectly reasonable terms.

I have nothing against new music. I have in my life heard a lot of it, and even performed quite a bit. Some of it became very well-known, but most of it was never or rarely heard again - not just the pieces I was in!

[RobertLeDiable]

Yes, just like Schoenberg. Found his voice in Transfigured Night and stuck with it. Didn't want to lose his fans!

But you're SO right. Proms should be planned with the needs of parents and children uppermost in our minds. So the music really "needs to be good"! I mean, a Dr Who prom wouldn't be a good idea would it? Never sustain interest with that...

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES! That upstart Sohal took REALLY took advantage of the noble BBC didn't he? All that NEW music. DISgraceful!

I don't know what you're on about. Did you read my posts? I offered MC an opinion on this composer's music, having heard a number of his pieces some years ago. I thought they were uninteresting and derivative - 'easy listening' if you like, with no great purpose. I happen to be extremely interested in new music as it happens - possibly even a lot better informed than you. I also happen to think a 45' new piece plus a big romantic concerto plus a big romantic symphony with two intervals isn't terribly good planning, and looks like a rather cack-handed attempt to sweeten the pill of the unfamiliar.

It can make programming a new piece difficult if it turns out to be a great deal longer than was asked for, and I was merely speculating that this might have been the case this time. I know of what I speak.

[teamsaint]

Scheduling longer concerts(of which I am all in favour given the brevity of some programmes) on a Saturday night with a 7.00 Pm start might work well.

[jayne lee wilson]

Oh come on now, Mary, Rob and Sir John... posts 3,5,7,8...14..? . and 33! "most of it was never or rarely heard again" ! (Amazing how many of Mozart's contemporaries were geniuses isn't it? Wonder how often Totentanz will have been performed 5 years from now...)

Those messages are scarcely open or welcoming to new experiences are they? Too many "classical music lovers" enjoy a grimace at the expense of "contemporary music", and it feeds a kind of passive prejudice in the wider world.

But it is CERTAINLY an example of poor programming! Yes, SO easy for a musiclover to skip part one. (Or a TV Channel to edit it out...)

[Mary Chambers]

Oh come on now, Mary, Rob and Sir John... posts 3,5,7,8...14..? . and 33! "most of it was never or rarely heard again" laugh: )

I wasn't making a point, I was stating a fact - about the new pieces I have heard or I took part in. Most of them were never heard again. On the other hand, I heard the premieres of War Requiem and several other Britten works, and was at one of the very early performances (3rd or 4th) of The Tempest by Ades, which I went to London specially to see. I am always interested in hearing new pieces, so please don't imply that I'm not.

[VodkaDilc]

On the other hand, I heard the premieres of War Requiem and several other Britten works, .

I'm green with envy!

[Mary Chambers]

I'm green with envy!

Don't get too excited. I wasn't present at the Britten
first performances, alas - I heard them on Radio 3, or in the case of Owen Wingrave saw it on television. Exciting, but not quite the same as being there.

[VodkaDilc]

Don't get too excited. I wasn't present at the Britten
first performances, alas - I heard them on Radio 3, or in the case of Owen Wingrave saw it on television. Exciting, but not quite the same as being there.

I see. I managed Owen Wingrave and (though I'm not sure if they were just the first broadcast performances or the actual first performances) The Prodigal Son, Phaedra and the revised Paul Bunyan.

[Mary Chambers]

I see. I managed Owen Wingrave and (though I'm not sure if they were just the first broadcast performances or the actual first performances) The Prodigal Son, Phaedra and the revised Paul Bunyan.

Very many Britten premieres were broadcast live by Radio 3, from the days when it was the newly founded Third Programme. I don't know if there's a list anywhere.

[PhilipT]

Proms should be planned with the needs of parents and children uppermost in our minds.

Er, why? Many parents need reminding that their children's education is subsidised by the taxes of those who don't have children. Many parents need reminding that they made the choice to have children and they should not burden others with the consequences of that choice. Sometimes these reminders need to be made quite forcibly, because such parents tend to acquire selective deafness in these matters.

I don't have a problem with some Proms being geared towards children - quite the reverse. But all Proms?

The most important part of a child's education is learning that the world does not revolve around them, whatever impression they may have gained from their parents.

[Mary Chambers]

I don't have a problem with some Proms being geared towards children - quite the reverse. But all Proms?

.

Jayne was being heavily sarcastic. Not sure why, but there you are.

[PhilipT]

Then I apologise. My tendency to take people literally is strong enough I've been accused of having Asperger's syndrome. A suitable smiley might've helped.

[Barbirollians]

Er, why? Many parents need reminding that their children's education is subsidised by the taxes of those who don't have children. Many parents need reminding that they made the choice to have children and they should not burden others with the consequences of that choice. Sometimes these reminders need to be made quite forcibly, because such parents tend to acquire selective deafness in these matters.

I don't have a problem with some Proms being geared towards children - quite the reverse. But all Proms




The most important part of a child's education is learning that the world does not revolve around them, whatever impression they may have gained from their parents.

Whilst I agree entirely that the Proms should not be designed for the tastes of children I see no reason why arrangements for concerts should not be as family friendly as possible.

One of the reasons education is funded by taxation is that it benefits us all . Those children may save the lives of those who don't have children or in otherwise enrich them .